AuthorTopic: RCF 312a VS. Yamaha DXR 12 (Read 12942 times)

price difference between zlx 10" and a dxr10 would account for things such as clarity at higher volumes...

so even though the SPL difference between the two differently priced speakers is not very noticable, and the larger frequency response might not matter for people using subs... you are still getting a lot better clarity AT HIGHER VOLUMES (nothing to do with its Highdef-ness at lower volumes)

BASICALLY THE QUESTION IS...

should I get the RCF art 310a? are these speakers going to be able to handle large events (100, 250, 300 person) WHEN USED with a sub woofer?... am i going to regret not just getting some zlx112p for small 50 person gigs if i try to bust out the RCF 10" and they arent loud enough or something.

i already know that the RCF are known for a certain clarity in treble and mids when cranked... and decent bass. not sure whether this is necessarily the same level of clarity as QSC K in terms of numbers and specs... but it certainly has more character and the illusion of having this "magical" ability to maintain clarity when pushed...

a 10" with clarity at high volumes is the main selling point for me... dont need 12" or 15" if i use a sub.... wont need "deep mode" or DXR lower frequency response etc etc....

... but are the RCF art 310a going to be so small that all i end up with pathetic max SPL... these are known for being smaller than most 10" speakers as well... i can't really imagine these speakers competing with a 12 inch in terms of loudness (not frequency)... while i can imagine a dxr 10" 131SPL being non noticable from a dxr12 132

I think you're rapidly approaching the point where the best thing you can do is invest the time (and maybe a bit of money) in getting some of these speakers pointed at your own ears.

I know in some territories this is easier said than done, but make the effort to find out who the dealers are for some of these products near you and ask for demo's. If you can't get a demo per se, hire them for one event and see how they do in real life. Yeah, it's more money up front, but it's a lot less than ending up with speakers you just don't like or that won't cover the jobs you want them to do.

The thing with specs is, there are different ways of measuring/interpreting speakers performance, as you've learned already and the thing with opinions is that we all have our own filters based on our physical sense of hearing plus our accumulated experience of all the listening we've done over our lives - however much or little that may be. So no-one's experience of hearing a loudspeaker is going to exactly match your opinions, and unless any respondents have heard the exact combination of boxes you're asking about in a direct A-B comparison, their recollections may be influenced by a bunch of other factors.

I actually have gone to some music stores and tested out the speakers, this is why i kinda like the ZLX because of their warm deep sound... as is expected i couldnt really test SPL per se... just the overall sound...

the QSC K and JBL prs seemed pretty much the same to me... and were spoken highly of by the floor person...

the samson stuff seemed pretty flat to me i didnt like it

the DXR sounded flat but the grill was just so sexy and any song i played on it sounded very official,

thumps sounded surprisingly good

last night was the rockaway st patricks day parade and i was in the main bar people were going to... the DJ had two QSC's and two subs... and basically IT SOUNDED HORRIBLE... at close distance... far away it sounded OK... but when I went by the booth to check out his setup it sounded extremely muddy on the highs and mids... and the bass was, well, bass... it also wasn't that loud over all the voices and stuff... and i think he had 15" tops...

this leads me to believe i should get the RCF... because i just want something that will really do well on the highs and mids at high volumes... but the only problem is... i can only find their 10" and im worried i will run into volume problems... even though im well aware that bigger only means more bass responce... and only slight increases in SPL...

I have no idea what subs he was using, they were vertical rather than short fat ones... and the entire point im making is that even with subs... the QSC K tops sounded EXTREMELY muddy... when i was close to the booth.... from accross the room they sounded fine (i guess)... maybe that's as good as it gets... but id like to hold out hope that the RCF sound better.. (kinda hard to get a live demo of RCF but they are cheaper so id be happy with them if it turns out my theory is false)

I have no idea what subs he was using, they were vertical rather than short fat ones...

That would be the K sub, it is portable but it's sound is not a favorite among reviewers. The unfortunate thing with DJs is that it is very likely he/she was simply over driving their mixer/console or the tracks they were playing were bad sounding to begin with. Overall QSC powered speakers are well respected so I'd say this one experience you had is not representative of the brand.

I actually have gone to some music stores and tested out the speakers, this is why i kinda like the ZLX because of their warm deep sound... the QSC K and JBL prs seemed pretty much the same to me... and were spoken highly of by the floor person...

the samson stuff seemed pretty flat to me i didnt like it

the DXR sounded flat but the grill was just so sexy and any song i played on it sounded very official,

thumps sounded surprisingly good

You are making a classic mistake here with these auditions, you are gravitating to boxes with the roundest/warmest sound which also means the most bass output but you need at least 1 sub to do events of any size and as soon as you add a sub the bass response of the tops DOESN'T MATTER anymore because you're supposed to high pass the tops. Actually this could be why that QSC system sounded so muddy, they may have been running the tops fullrange which messes up that whole low-mid crossover area. DJs are famous for doing this... and a few other things... bugs the hell out of me. And don't forget that there are menu and switch settings on the back of these speakers for selecting between flat, monitor, or music modes that will make a noticable difference to the sound so you need to be aware of how these are set when comparing.So anyway back on track, what you should be doing when auditioning speakers is listening for those with the cleanest and most present mids and highs(Yamaha DXRs), you pair those with a capable sub, correctly engage crossovers on all boxes and you will have loud and clean sound.

I have no idea what subs he was using, they were vertical rather than short fat ones... and the entire point im making is that even with subs... the QSC K tops sounded EXTREMELY muddy... when i was close to the booth.... from accross the room they sounded fine (i guess)... maybe that's as good as it gets... but id like to hold out hope that the RCF sound better.. (kinda hard to get a live demo of RCF but they are cheaper so id be happy with them if it turns out my theory is false)

How someone else uses (and abuses) their gear and audience is not a way to judge ANY gear. I still run into local band's "guest engineers" (and brother-in-laws) that take my great sounding 4-way system and make it sound like their overdriven 15" 2-way club system, only louder! I know it's hard to demo gear in a store, but it's much worse to judge a system run by a random DJ in a random bar!

You are making a classic mistake here with these auditions, you are gravitating to boxes with the roundest/warmest sound which also means the most bass output but you need at least 1 sub to do events of any size and as soon as you add a sub the bass response of the tops DOESN'T MATTER anymore because you're supposed to high pass the tops. Actually this could be why that QSC system sounded so muddy, they may have been running the tops fullrange which messes up that whole low-mid crossover area. DJs are famous for doing this... and a few other things... bugs the hell out of me. And don't forget that there are menu and switch settings on the back of these speakers for selecting between flat, monitor, or music modes that will make a noticable difference to the sound so you need to be aware of how these are set when comparing.So anyway back on track, what you should be doing when auditioning speakers is listening for those with the cleanest and most present mids and highs(Yamaha DXRs), you pair those with a capable sub, correctly engage crossovers on all boxes and you will have loud and clean sound.

one of the points i was trying to make is that i want to get the RCF's for that reason... i was just listing what i noticed about each speaker... and ultimately the warmth or tone wasnt enough to sway me...

also... REALLY!?!? dj's will play tops full range even when they have subs... LOL... this was a big company in this area... they send guys out to pretty much any party you can imagine... my dad lives above them and doesnt really talk to them... but he says at 5 am you can always hear them comming back an banging around unloading speakers downstairs... the company owns all the equipment and probably pays the djs diddly squat but they pretty much do up to 10 gigs at a time... i find it hard to believe they wouldnt teach their DJ's to not do that... very odd...

also if he was properly using crossover... that tells me the 15" speakers and subs he had were just being overdriven and probably not powerful enough for a medium sized bar... and really makes me skeptical about buying the unusually small RCF 310a